A Discussion With the Anglo-Calvinists

I have several Anglican friends, mostly at Facebook, who belong to the Anglo-Calvinist party and do much kvetching about solving the Anglican identity problem by returning to a confessionalist understanding of the Anglican formumaries, which confessionalist understanding ought to be theologically Reformed since the framers of the formularies had come under the spell of early Reformed theology.  Some of them go as far as insisting on observing every jot and tittle of the Homilies, which means among other things an almost total prohibition on artwork in the church, and even things like the Advent wreath. 

A few days ago one of these friends posted something on his Facebook page about the ongoing discussions between the ACNA, the Lutheran Church Missouri Synod and the Lutheran Church - Canada's that might lead to some sort of communio in sacris down the line.  My friend lauded the talks but was also "troubled" by them because of the realist sacramentology of the Lutheran view of the Eucharist.  "Bring back the Black Rubric!" was the cry of some who participated in the Facebook discussion, along with aforesaid kvetching about the need for orthodox Anglo-Protestants to adhere strictly to the Reformed Way.  This touched off a discussion between me and one of the participants, my friend pastor Richard Lepage (he would not want me to call him "Father" ;>)),which I reproduce below.  I apologize in advance for its length, but I quote it here with a view toward giving my readers a glimpse into where I now stand on the matter, having spent some time in the Anglo-Calvinist camp myself before realizing both the ahistorical nature of that stance and its ultimate futility:

Embryo Parson:  The fact of the matter is that modern orthodox Anglicanism has largely moved past the Edwardian phase of the English Reformation. That will indeed be "troubling" to those of you who hanker for the Reformed heyday, but it is what it is, and there is little possibility that you all are going to be able to talk this more sacramentalist trajectory of orthodox Anglicanism back to the Reformed way. The Caroline Divines, and to a certain extent the Tractarians, have won the day. I would find a way to make peace with them via an appeal to historic Anglican comprehensiveness.  Not to mention historic Anglicanism's appeal to the Fathers.

Richard Lepage: If the historic standards remain legally the defining standards and have not been removed but only ignored or side-lined (even by a majority), they remain still the defining standards. The Carolines and Anglo-Catholics and Anglo-(insert whatever... presbyterian, pentecostal, 3-stream etc) have not won. They may have succeeded in misrepresenting/distorting what historically and officially defines Anglicanism ...in the popular mind (i.e. via media, 3 legged stool etc.) but they have not formally been able to change the standards. Subscription may be treated as a joke.... but it is still required (hence lip service is paid to it), discipline may be disdained.... but it is still required (hence in England when the rector of the church allowed a Muslim service to take place in the church, he received a token tap on the hand). The fact that oaths are still taken at ordination (even watered down) bear witness to the fact that Anglicanism was defined at a point in time and that definition remains in force so some token show must be made of observing it in order to be able to lay at least superficial claim to the title "Anglican". The formularies as established, written and intended (as so many of us argue for the interpretation of our U.S. Constitution) must be (with all their limitations and frustrations) what defines us if we are to be authentically Anglican. Not Westminster, not Augsburg, not Trent. If they do not, if we refuse to have the integrity to be truly and distinctly what we claim to be (Anglican) then we simply prove what so many already suspect , that Anglicanism is a joke, a meaningless term that means whatever you want it to mean depending on who you are and what your predilections and fancies lean towards. We have for too long been the denomination/expression that stands for nothing and falls for everything. That is not what our fathers, who died very real & horrible deaths, went to the stake for. And we mock them when we ignore what they intended. I may prefer 1552, another may prefer 1549, but it was 1662 that was established and settled on. The same goes for the 10 Articles vs. the 42 Articles.... 39 was what was established and settled on, and what we should have the integrity to accept and represent accurately in our ministries or have the integrity to depart to where we would better fit in. I will give Newman this, he may have been a disingenuous eisegete, but in the end he did the right and honest thing by going to the church where he most belonged and where he did not feel compelled to subvert what that church officially stood for. Anybody can look for loopholes thru which to drive the truck of their preferences thru. But I think Christian integrity demands we yield our preferences to the standards of the church we claim to be a part of. This is what I think is most admirable about Puritans and High Churchman... who conformed. Who chose to accept the surplice in place of the Genevan or the Alb/chasuble. Not because it was better or more holy or "right" but because it better expressed the identity of who they had chosen to be a part of.... despite their personal preferences.

Embryo Parson: Hi Richard. Allow me to touch on a few of these points:

First, the historic standards remain "legally" the defining standards only in the Church of England, unless you're using that term in a looser sense with reference to Anglican provinces outside of the CofE that require their clergy to subscribe to them.

Secondly, as to whether or not the non-Reformed parties of Anglicanism have "won." As I said earlier today in a reply to Sarah Hey, there are no data on the future, but my educated guess is that Reformed Anglicanism will not experience the kind of resurgence you hope to see, though it likely will, and should, remain a valid theologoumenon in our church.

Thirdly, while it is true that the Church of England's formularies received final legal imprimatur in 1662, it is equally true that 1662 marks the final defeat of Puritanism and Presbyterianism after a protracted struggle between those factions and the Anglicans that began with the accession of Elizabeth. The Reformed cause suffered an almost total defeat by degrees at the hands of both Tudor and Stuart monarchs, and at the hands of a string of mostly Arminian Anglican divinity beginning with Hooker. Reformed Anglicans, though they can correctly claim that early Reformed theology influenced the men responsible for drafting the formularies, must nevertheless admit with McCulloch and others that the Reformed cause was short-circuited, allowing later divinity to go on a different trajectory. While it is true that many if not most of the Caroline Divines called themselves "Protestants" and "conformed" to the formularies, they were nevertheless effectively taking Anglican theology in a patristic and Catholic direction. The Edwardian Reformers are even partly to blame for that, as they made much of the fact that their Reformation represented in large part a return to the Fathers, a claim that was echoed by Caroline and Tractarian alike. The problem is, the devil is in the details when we take up the agenda of returning to the Fathers. Or, as they all would likely put it, God, not the devil, is in those details, because God was with the Fathers long before He was with the Reformers.

I have argued at my blog and elsewhere, in response to Anglo-Catholics who desire to wash the Reformation right out of their hair, that we conservative Anglicans, who MUST hang together lest we hang separately, should aspire to demonstrate the same kind of "comprehensiveness" that marked the church of the first millennium. There we had both an Augustinian trajectory that stressed doctrines of immediate grace and non-Augustinian one that stressed the ecclesial and sacramental dimensions of salvation, which include both dynamic symbolist and more realist views of the Eucharist. Both theologies, I would submit, are right there in Holy Scripture, and thus should be viewed as complementary. That's why I recommended to Matt that maybe, instead of digging in your heels in support of the proposition that true Anglicanism is Calvinian Anglicanism, you might think about making the tent a little bigger, as the church of the first millennium did.

Richard Lepage: In a small town for the last 20 years the same town sheriff has eaten donuts, hung out with the good old boys, taken naps and done nothing to enforce the laws or keep the people safe. People gradually got used to lawlessness and doing whatever they want, to the point of regarding the situation as "normal". The old sheriff finally dies of a heart attack and a new Sheriff takes his place and begins enforcing the laws. A new generation tired of the lawlessness supports this return to law and order but the majority of the old generation says "this is not the way things are supposed to be, it is normal for us to get away with this and get away with that and do what ever we want." And story after story is told about this guy who broke this, and that guys who got away with that. So the new Sheriff asks "Have the laws been changed or replaced?" The answer comes back "No". So the Sheriff replies... "What's your point?"

The CofE is sick, corrupt but not dead and thus remains the original archetype of Anglicanism who defined Anglicanism and established its standards. Those have not been formally replaced and remain historically and legally the standard. Ignored, mocked, unpopular & sidelined… yes. But still the established definition and the official standard. Other national churches can choose to adhere closely or follow loosely those standards or make up their own. But whatever they choose to do, their actions do not change the definition of the original. They are only derivatives.

If the CofE formally changes/replaces those standards and redefines herself then this becomes another discussion altogether… but it hasn’t yet.

For better or worse the formularies stand. Not as Reformed or Lutheran or Catholic as some might like…. But cite and quote anybody you like of the factions, interpreters, re-interpreters or commentators who come after they are established (and yes I know there are many) and all can be measured by how close or how far their opinion is from the sensus literalis of the applicable formulary. This is why Newman’s Tract 90 is so laughable.

But that is the point. Reformed, Lutheran, Catholic, Eastern Orthodox or Pentecostal leaning…. They all remain merely “opinions after the fact”. Tell me story after story about how big this faction is or is not or how popular this theologian is or is not and it does not matter. The standard remains the standard until it is changed. Formally change or remove the formularies and we now have another discussion altogether. But until then…. Opinions are like arses, everybody has one. wink emoticon

Do I understand that standard cuts both ways? Yep. I really like the way Peter Robinson made his point below. He shows how it cuts both ways… these X are more Lutheran, but that Y is more Calvinistic. I personally can live with that. The formularies are not as tightly reformed as the Westminster Standards….

But they are certainly not the “Big Tent” - “every theological oxymoron is allowable and beautiful” that is what so much of American Anglicanism is. The idea that evangelism can be effective in a church that holds numerous diametrically opposed soteriologies, Christologies, is incoherent when it comes to expressing the relationship between Scripture and Tradition and shares common ground pretty much only in respect to homosexuality being a sin, is ludicrous. It is with good reason we are viewed from many quarters as fruitcakes.

The formularies will not please everybody on every point. When we come to them, most have to give up something, I like the WCF in some areas better than the 39 AOR, but I recognize I cannot impose WCF on the 39 AOR or I will be as guilty of illegitimate non-conformity as an Anglo-Catholic who completely ignores them, so I have to give up something that I prefer for the greater good of the whole. But the chaos we have now is not good for the whole. Thus the formulaires provide the best authoritative & legitimate definition of what Anglicanism is, they bring us back to center (which is a very strong, robust and evangelically effective center) it is a center that motivated men to spread the Gospel far more extensively throughout the world than any other Protestant denomination. And it can do that again. If we stop being the church of the 3 stooges who have a different answer for every question and act like that is a sane and reasonable option.

I know very well the convoluted histories of what Laud did or that Hooker said this and Andrewes said that and we can swap trivia all day long…. But at the end of the day, like it or not, the formularies are the heart and foundation of authentic Anglicanism. It is what I subscribed to when I was ordained, and I for one did not subscribe tongue in cheek or with my fingers crossed behind my back. This is what the Jerusalem Declaration confesses and what the Church of Nigeria and CANA adheres to formally. And it is to them I belong, and where I will stand unless they change those standards. Pax.

Embryo Parson: Richard, it doesn't seem to me that much of your long and passionate post is really responsive to what I wrote, but I will leave the matter be for now.

As an interesting and related aside, however, I have to tell you that there's a chance I will end up in the Anglo-Catholic-leaning Anglican Province of America, which is in communion with both the REC and the Church of Nigeria. An example of the kind of "little-bigger-tent" Anglicanism to which I argue you and I should aspire.

Richard Lepage: Let me make it simpler. The formularies stand until changed. Opinions offered until then are pretty much smoke and mirrors.

Embryo Parson: "Opinions offered until then are pretty much smoke and mirrors." Except that they clearly aren't, when the larger orthodox Anglican picture is in view.

Richard Lepage: In your opinion I suppose. Have a good night.

Embryo Parson: Yes, in my opinion, and for the reasons I set forth in my own lengthy response.

Comments

[Stefano]

Is Richard Lepage really comparing pre-Reformation Christianity with a lazy sheriff?????????

[Embryo Parson]

As I noted in the blog entry, its purpose is to give my readers a glimpse into where I now stand, i.e., what I believe "classical" Anglicanism must encompass. This is especially true since Caroline divinity and not Edwardian divinity is generally considered the "golden age" of Anglican theology.

As I said, Richard Lepage is a friend, and we agree on a number of things. The defense he lays out here of his position is an articulate and forceful one, and he is accordingly to be commended.